Kudos to 'Sakura-Martinez' for the review that made me both chuckle and blush!
Hope you all enjoy this next chapter!
The atmosphere in the small London bistro was buzzing as conversations between couples and friends sounded out while they sat around small tables. Chloe followed Beca through the entrance and stood nervously by her side as they waited to be seated. This was a big deal. Like, a really big deal. She and Beca were actually on a date!
Chloe felt a little knot in her stomach. Beca was everything she had craved for over the past few years that she had known and loved her, but a part of her was still apprehensive. Apprehensive because she had never been on a date with a woman before and she wondered if they would get odd glances from the people sat around them. She looked around the bistro as they waited patiently to be seen by a member of staff. She loved the 'shabby chic' feel of the place, with it's low lighting and wooden panelled walls. All of a sudden Chloe noticed a table with two women sat at it and she began to relax. The two were very clearly on a date, holding each other's hands across the table, and nobody around them seemed to be bothered by it. Perhaps this was the perk of being in London? You could be whoever you wanted to be and with whoever you wanted.
A waiter approached them with a smile, "Hi there, table for two?"
"Um yeah, I booked a table actually?" Beca began, and Chloe glanced at her best friend in surprise, "For 7.45. It should be under 'Mitchell'?" Chloe looked back at the waiter as he looked at the booking list and identified the name while Beca muttered an apology for being a bit early. Chloe still couldn't believe Beca had had the initiative to book at table. She noticed Beca glance at her with a small smile before the two followed the waiter over to the only seemingly free table, beside the front window.
The two women sat down gently, both seeming to want to make a good impression to the other despite having known each other for six years. The waiter handed them both menus, and asked for their drink order. Chloe stared down at the menu nervously. She felt her blood go a little cold as she saw the price of wine by the glass. She needed to have a drink tonight, no question. But from the looks of the expensive drinks menu, she'd be having no more than a bowl of olives for dinner.
"A bottle of rosé please. Two glasses." Chloe looked up from the menu to look at her best friend, surprised by her order, but Beca held a hand up to stop her from protesting, "And two shots of sambucca."
As the waiter walked off Chloe put her menu down with a slightly furrowed brow, "You don't like rosé."
She saw Beca shrug slightly and give her a small smile, "No, but you do." Chloe couldn't help the smile that slowly grew on her face as the reality of how generous the brunette was hit her, "I mean, I don't hate rosé. Besides, I'm buying so it's only fair that you get your favourite drink. And don't you dare try to pay Miss Beale! I'm the higher earner of the two of us."
For a moment Chloe was speechless as she looked over at her best friend. Her heart was racing. Beca looked stunning. She had opted to pull the left side of her hair back with hair grips, allowing her long dark hair to fall over her right shoulder. She counted the three piercings along the woman's left ear. Beca had her signature eyeliner around her eyes, and smoky eyeshadow which Chloe always felt made her seem dark and mysterious. The redhead found herself looking down at Beca's lips, loving the way they appeared to part slightly with the small nervous smile that her best friend was giving her.
"So…here we are." Chloe found herself airing nervously and Beca seemed to nod in agreement, "Yep, here we are."
The two fell silent again as they held each other's gaze. Chloe noticed that Beca's smile had dropped slightly and she began to panic. What if this wasn't such a good idea? It was everything she thought she'd ever wanted, but if Beca didn't feel comfortable being with her in this capacity then perhaps it was best that they just remained best friends?
"I'm sorry…" Beca began, which didn't help Chloe's panic, and her heart rate increased as Beca looked down at the little candle that flickered between them, "…I don't know how to do…this. Like, go on a first date-"
"-with a girl?" Chloe found herself interrupting and Beca looked back up at her nervously.
"I was going to say at a restaurant but yeah also with a girl. I've never been on a date with…a girl."
"Me either." Chloe confessed quietly. She'd been on several first dates before though. In high school it had been trips to the shopping mall and a couple to the cinema. In college it had been more like meeting guys at parties and one thing leading to another instead of her being asked out on a date. Since graduating she'd gone on a pity-date with a guy back in her hometown, who had so desperately wanted to take her to dinner, and she'd made him settle for lunch. She had even had a date with a guy once in New York. That had been a mistake.
Chloe unlocked the front door to her apartment and stepped inside, closing the door behind her and leaning her back on it with a huge sigh of relief. She had just spent the past two hours on an excruciatingly painful date with some guy that had given her his number after she had served him coffee yesterday. It wasn't unusual for her to get given numbers. But it was unusual for her to ever call them. The only reason she'd called this guy was because unfortunately Beca had been sat at the tiny table beside the coffee counter when he had given her his number, and her best friend had insisted she call him to arrange a date.
"How was it?" Chloe heard Beca call out to her from the lounge and the redhead slid her heels off her feet before walking through to find her. She slumped into the space on the sofa beside the brunette and brought her feet up onto Beca's lap, groaning slightly at how awful her date was. "That bad huh?"
"He spent the first hour and a half talking about himself, his wife turned up and started an argument with him, AND when my meal arrived my fish was cold!" Chloe groaned again "Worst date ever! How was your evening?"
"Woah, hold on, can we go back to the part where his wife turned up?" Chloe couldn't help the smile that poked from her mouth as her best friend suddenly turned to her eagerly awaiting details.
"Yep, turns out he's married. His wife happened to be in the same restaurant as us for her sisters bachelorette party when she'd spotted him."
"Nooooo!" Beca said, her eyes opening wide at the revelation, a big grin on her face, "What did you do?"
"Well I left!" Chloe couldn't help but smile, playfully slapping her best friend on the arm, "That's the last time I let you talk me into going on a date with a random guy!"
"You're your own woman Chlo, you could've just said no!" Beca said with a chuckle, "Plus you haven't been on a date since we moved here, I figured tonight would've been a great opportunity. You're too beautiful to not have a chance at finding love." Chloe suddenly felt embarrassed as her best friend complimented her, so glanced over at their small coffee table that sat between the small sofa and their TV. She noticed two empty bottles of beer. Not normally enough to make the brunette start rambling about 'love' but Chloe wondered if perhaps Beca had forgotten to have any dinner tonight as she'd been out. Beca had a habit of losing track of time when she was on her laptop. She heard her continue, "But, I promise, next date I'll make sure I'm eating at the same place so I can rescue you if needed."
The redhead looked back over at her best friend who had just begun scrolling through Instagram while stroking Chloe's feet absent minded. Chloe couldn't help but smile. If only Beca knew just how much she wanted the next time to actually be with her.
Chloe held her breath. There was something that had struck her with what Beca had just said, and she plucked up the courage to ask, "So you and Jesse never had a first date?"
She saw Beca waiver and suddenly her stomach knotted. Had that been a terrible question? She had to admit they'd not really mentioned Jesse since Chloe had called Beca after finding out that they'd broken up. That was almost two years ago now. Almost two years since her life had changed dramatically, leading to this very moment.
Chloe watched Beca shrug before looking up at her and speaking slowly, "Not really. I mean, we would just sit in one of our dorms and watch movies. The closest thing we got to eating food together was popcorn." She saw Beca screw her face up in slight embarrassment, "So I have no idea how to behave on a first date at a restaurant." The brunette started to talk at a faster rate as she began to panic and Chloe couldn't help but feel a warm glow as Beca revealed things that she had always wanted to hear her say, "And it's you…I'm here with you…I mean, God, I never imagined we would ever be doing something like this, and now we are, we're here at this swanky bistro, in England, on a date…and I'm rambling because I'm an idiot, and I can't stop, and it's making things weird, I'm being so weird. God! Can we get our drinks please?" Chloe let out a soft smile as Beca yelled the final words out towards the bistro's bar, not to anyone in particular, then put her head in her hands. The brunette said quietly, "ugh, I'm sorry. I just…I really don't want to mess this up...because I really like you."
Chloe felt her heart skip a beat as her best friend looked up at her with a sheepish grin. "I really like you too" Chloe said quietly, her smile still whispered across her face.
"A bottle of rosé…" the waiter announced as he appeared beside the two women and Chloe exhaled a breath that she hadn't realised she'd been holding. Two glasses were placed between herself and Beca, rosé poured out by the waiter, "and two sambucca's", two shots of sambucca were placed in front of the best friend's. Chloe stared down at the shot glass of clear liquid. This was her and Beca's liqueur of choice when doing shots. Any time they went out and shots were involved it was only ever sambucca.
They ordered their food, the waiter left, and Chloe saw Beca lift her shot glass, holding it out to her. Chloe held her own shot glass up and the two 'clinked' the glasses, both with nervous smiles on their faces, "Here's to us I guess?" Beca said.
"To us."
The women downed their sambucca's in one, both scrunching their noses up as the alcohol burnt the back of their throats. Chloe let out a small giggle as she felt a slight buzz of confidence from the Dutch Courage that Beca and herself had just quickly consumed.
"Did you ever like me back in college?" She found herself suddenly asking, "Like…like-like?"
Chloe saw Beca swallow nervously as she shrugged, "Erm…I dunno, maybe?" Chloe's heard dropped a little. She'd been expecting her to say no. 'Maybe' implied that there had been moments when Beca may have liked Chloe more than just a friend during college. If she had, and Chloe had known, maybe she'd have had more confidence in telling Beca how she felt back then.
"Oh…right…" Chloe found herself responding.
"It was a couple of years ago Chlo, a lot's happened since then. My memory is rubbish enough as it is, you know that."
Chloe looked down at the table they were sat at. At the small vase that held a single yellow gerbera. At the tea light that flickered between them. "No I know…" Chloe began quietly, "I just…back in final year when we went to Aubrey's boot camp…"
"I was very stressed during that trip. Me getting annoyed with you was me getting annoyed with us all having to be there, not because I liked you…"
Chloe's heart skipped a beat as she realised that Beca had no idea what she was talking about, "That's not what I meant." She said, and looked up at her best friend who had appeared to stare at her as though trying to read the redhead's mind, "When we were all sat around that campfire on the final night. You looked at me in a way I'd never seen you look at me before so…I just wondered if you'd liked me then."
She held her breath. Beca swallowed loudly, looked down at her hands as she fiddled with her thumb ring, and scrunched up her face as though struggling to get the next few words out, "Ah…yeah…that was kinda the moment…you know…I may have thought I liked you. Like, like-liked you." Chloe's face opened in shock but Beca noticed and continued quickly before the redhead could say anything, "And I know, I know, I should've told you…maybe…and I nearly did. That next morning. By the lake? I nearly told you that I liked you but then we started talking about Jesse and you told me to stick with him and…yeah…" Chloe was speechless as Beca looked up at her with a slight smile, "Still, we're here now?" And Chloe found herself furrowing her brow in curiosity as a big grin grew on her best friend's face, "You liked me a lot back in college though didn't you…"
Chloe felt the heat rise in her cheeks as Beca called her out on her feelings, and a small smile grew on her face, "Maybe…?" She took a gulp of her wine as she heard Beca let out a chuckle,
"Oh come on dude, never mind how I'd looked at you by that campfire, you used to give me 'a look' all the time!"
Chloe rolled her eyes with an embarrassed grin while Beca took a gulp of her own wine, "It wasn't all the time!"
"It was most of the time!"
"Alright fine." Chloe conceded, taking another gulp of wine before letting out a small sigh, raising her eyebrows slightly as she confessed, "I was…just…trying to see if you would ever look at me the way…I looked at you. Three and a half years of looking and finally, by that campfire, you did."
She noticed Beca take a deep breath. If they weren't on a date already she had a feeling the two of them would be absolutely distraught that they had missed each other's cues over the years. But Beca was right, they were now here, together, on a date with each other.
"Looks like you'd noticed how I felt before even I did."
Chloe almost spat her wine out as Beca bit her bottom lip, and the redhead leant back in her chair, "Are you kidding? Beca, I've never known anyone to be as hard to read as you. There was no way I could've ever worked out what was going on in that head of yours, especially back then! Why do you think I was so surprised when you told me this afternoon…?"
"Well I'm really pleased I finally did." Beca said with a smile.
"I'm pleased you did too."
Not for the first time that evening the two women fell silent again. Chloe looked back down at the small vase on their table, a soft smile on her face as she thought about how odd it felt that they were now finally revealing to each other not only how they felt at that moment but how they had felt years ago.
"Do you like the flower?" Chloe heard Beca ask and the redhead's smile broadened as she reached out to glaze her fingertips over the petals of the yellow flower. Her absolute favourite colour!
"My favourite kind." She said quietly.
"I know, that's why I got it."
Chloe's heart skipped a beat at Beca's words and she quickly looked up at her best friend who was smiling at her. The redhead immediately looked around the bistro and noticed that of the tables she could see, none had gerberas in their small vases, but what looked like pink orchids instead. "How did you…"
"There's a florist on the corner. I ran there then ran here earlier so I could book a table and make sure we had a good table with a good flower. Your favourite flower."
Chloe literally couldn't contain how overwhelmed she felt right now and tears began to well up in her eyes. No person she had ever gone on a date with had been this thoughtful. Or…romantic. And if there was one thing she could have never imagined Beca Mitchell to be it was romantic. Oh how the brunette was proving her wrong.
Thank you again for all the reviews!
This is probably the last 'short' (2500-ish words) chapter :)
Until tomorrow! xx